Cleaner Price! AIBU?

[Wyntersdiary]

So i was looking for quote for a cleaner and most of them came back at what i thought it would be, between 10 - 15 PH except one... £25 PER HOUR for just 1 person! i couldnt believe it , i wish i could get paid £25 an hour to clean someones house.

End of tenancy clean ... £95 for 2 hours!!!

This is all for just cleaning a bathroom, lounge and kitchen .. in a small flat as i said bedrooms didnt need doing... im shocked.

Yes I concede the new expensive cleaner is arse about face asking for references before starting.

However, perhaps she has an entrepreneurial spirit and plans to offer trial cleans, a one off, pay if you're satisfied set up? < I may be clutching at straws> I mean, good feedback is a valuable asset.

I say that because I started out by offering a 2 hour free trial clean to residents in my little village. Unsurprisingly, I had a lot of takers but it eventually paid off as some of those residents have remained customers.

Where’s the harm in trying?

Other than pissing off a lot of other cleaners.

They can’t just up their rates to match this “new kid on the block“

I’m self employed. If I contacted my existing clients and informed them that I was increasing my hourly rate to more than double, most of them would drop me like a stone. I lost a few clients when I increased my hourly rate by £2.50 a couple of years ago!!!

So those cleaners who have spent a lot of time building up their clients aren’t in a position (I would imagine) to up their rates by a huge percentage just because one other cleaner has come along and set a price so much higher.

Do she have an entrepreneurial spirit?

An entrepreneurial spirit would be to offer something that no one else does (or can), and taps into a niche that no one else has tapped into.

Entrepreneurial spirit isn’t simply coming along and saying “I’m new, please recommend me, and my cost is more than double what others are asking”!!

(I know you weren’t suggesting that it was that Clare. I’m just being a little facetious in order to try and explain my point)

Maybe the OP could provide more details in that respect...

@contrmary

YANBU - it's a crazy price when you think about it, if she works 37.5 hours per week it's the thick end of £50k per year! Reining it in a bit, £10 an hour would be fairer, just under £20k per year.

I'm really insulted by this, as an ex self employed cleaner. I couldn't work 8 hour days unless it was an end of tenancy. So it was two hours at one place, half hour drive to the next, say hello, unload etc. The driving time between appointments wasn't paid and there were times I'd only be paid for five hours. But I was fully booked. Regular clients didn't want me arriving at 7am when they're rushing or sleeping or working late interrupting their downtime.

Insurance and marketing is a lot. More than you think. I loved the work but people being snooty thinking my pay was too high because in their opinion my job was worth less than there's I say take a hike.

Yes I think that's the bone of contention Sparkl The suggestion that cleaners are outrageous tricksters to charge more than £10 an hour, they must be laughing all the way to the bank.

I may not be adept at commenting on the socio-economic impact of trying to inflate prices beyond "market rate" ripples but by heck I could turn your house around in an hour. And I won't do it for ten pounds.

Haha!

Can I post my address on here Clare?

Would you take away an old heavy reclining chair that has one leg falling off away for me as well?

I’ve asked my 75 year old mother, but she keeps on reclining, sorry declining!!

Yes unfortunately, I charge £95 ph for three legged chair removal.

Cleaning is bloody hard work why shouldn’t they earn a good wage ? Some really mean snobby people on here

Does the price go up or down if it’s a two legged chair?

Nice try Ripples No discount for hacking legs off before I arrive.

@ripples101

You ask if the £25-an-hour cleaner has "entrepreneurial spirit" because you perhaps assume they haven't any differentiation between themselves and a £12.50 an hour cleaner.

We have a new laundry service/dry cleaner that's launched near where I live in Surrey. It charges around 50% more than others but there are subtleties in the marketing and the premises which tell me I think it won't suffer at all. Normal dry cleaners around here are "in and out" premises, they seem to offer an eco shop in terms of washing products, a dedicated stain removal and fabric treatment service, mending, etc. Simple menu of services, loyalty scheme, very friendly people. Nothing that's radical but the way it's presented seems new and appealing.

If a cleaner really positioned his or herself in a surprising and market-appealing way, showing clearly what you get for that £25 and introducing a new way of thinking about the value of £12.50 an hour vs blitzing your house for £25, I would easily listen.

Any tradespeople who make their work easy to understand, who are clear in communication, who are on time, punctual, leave little behind in mess, I'm always happy for them to charge more. It's a differentiatior/point of interest and the kind of thing that spreads word of mouth

@TooGood2BeTrue

I think it's reasonable to charge more for a professional clean at the end of tenancy because the cleaner will have to do a proper deep clean and cover areas that wouldn't have been touched by the tenants in ages / ever, such as the top of kitchen cupboards, inside drawers etc. It does annoy me a bit when unskilled labourers can charge more than I could get away with in my industry (translation), where most clients require you to have a university degree, but it's supply and demand at the end of the day.

Why wouldn't tenants have cleaned those areas? Are you one of those people who thinks that tenants don't clean ever, purely by virtue of being tenants?

@Skyla2005

Cleaning is bloody hard work why shouldn’t they earn a good wage ? Some really mean snobby people on here

As well as a good dose of sexism. Some comments on here are definitely due to the fact that cleaning is traditionally seen as women's work.

It's embarrassing how negative it is

Agreed

@GinDaddyRedux

Re “entrepreneurial spirit” - is a good point that SmileyClare made, and that you followed up on. I did end my post asking that perhaps the OP could expand on this.

I agree with you. Maybe they are able to blitz a house, and or work a lot quicker - I.e do in one hour what it may take other cleaners 2 hours to do (hence their doubling of the hourly rate).

Who knows? Well the OP may be able to shed light on this, otherwise we are all just really assuming.

I used to get £10 an hour when I was employed as a cleaner several years ago and I didn't have to pay for my own equipment etc.

Self employed cleaners won't be getting paid for 37.5 hours a week as they will need to travel between jobs.

I'm paying £180 for a 4 hour end of tenancy clean for a small flat, so not much difference. And it includes A LOT of detail. It's the going rate.

@NoWordForFluffy I've never been charged when I have vacated a property because I clean it properly. I reckon the majority of tenants clean properly when they leave. I only clean the ones that don't.

[quote Northernsoullover]@NoWordForFluffy I've never been charged when I have vacated a property because I clean it properly. I reckon the majority of tenants clean properly when they leave. I only clean the ones that don't.[/quote]
Me neither. I always clean properly (and generally leave the property cleaner than when I moved it!).

The only rental place I arranged an end of tenancy clean for was a flat my company rented for me when I worked in Glasgow. Work paid, so I decided I'd be lazy for once and let the professionals do it!

Only on MN is £25 an hour for cleaner considered for be perfectly reasonable. Now back in the real world it’s about £12-15 an hour. Cleaning is tiring and it’s physically demanding but it’s not skilled work, anyone can do it - they really can if they can be bothered and to consider £25 to be the norm is mad. Obviously if someone wants to charge £25 and can get people to pay it then great but it’s a lot of money and it’s not the norm.

@coronabeer23 not everyone can clean. I had a friend cover for me with all my clients when I was I'll, she couldn't clean for toffee. It's not skilled as such but many are crap at it.

I wouldn't dream of charging £25 hour though!

@NoWordForFluffy, increasing infirmity prevents many of us from carrying out those chores that were once part of our regular cleaning. I can no longer grip firmly with my right hand or balance on a step ladder. It sounds trivial but is an utter bloody nuisance. Without a cleaner I'd be lost and house would be grubby. She can charge what she likes if she's good.

That's her prices. Whether she does well or not is not your concern. Your concern is can you afford it. Doesn't seem like it if you're this outraged from January to still be going on about it, we are 7 months ahead now. Do your own cleaning if you can't afford it, and find something else to be outraged by. It seems a bit pathetic to still be complaining now.

[quote longwayoff]@NoWordForFluffy, increasing infirmity prevents many of us from carrying out those chores that were once part of our regular cleaning. I can no longer grip firmly with my right hand or balance on a step ladder. It sounds trivial but is an utter bloody nuisance. Without a cleaner I'd be lost and house would be grubby. She can charge what she likes if she's good.[/quote]
What's that got to do with my point being about tenants in particular not cleaning?

I haven't even commented on the whys or wherefores of cleaners or the cost of paying a cleaner.

Get a cleaner if you like. Pay what you like. But don't assume that tenants - just by virtue of being tenants - don't do cleaning. That is lazy thinking, buying into 'renters are lowlife' rhetoric.

As a tenant, I never paid for an end of tenancy clean. I did it myself. Didn't get money taken off either. Did the same as a student. It's not hard, dunno why most seem incapable of doing it. I guess too lazy and think of it as beneath them.

@KeepingPlain

As a tenant, I never paid for an end of tenancy clean. I did it myself. Didn't get money taken off either. Did the same as a student. It's not hard, dunno why most seem incapable of doing it. I guess too lazy and think of it as beneath them.

Who says 'most' tenants aren't cleaning themselves?

Some think that they have to comply with a tenancy which says it must be professionally cleaned, not realising that as long as it's clean (and as good as, if not better than the inventory) then they don't have to pay for it, they can do it themselves.

Despite having been a tenant, you've bought into the anti-tenant rhetoric too.